Homlessness and Education
Homlessness and EducationHomlessness and Education
In the two studies I reviewed, both pertained to school aged homeless children. Both studies were conducted to determine the need for a better education for these children. The first study I reviewed was called, Sheltered homeless children: Their eligibility and unmet need for special education evaluations. This study focused on the exploration of unmet need of special education evaluations
for homeless children in Los Angeles, California. The second of my studies was called, Cognitive and academic functioning of homeless children compared to housed children. The analyzation focused on the effects of being homeless to a child's cognitive and academic functioning.
Both of the above studies brought about the same basic issue of homeless children having the right to a better education. In both studies it was determined that homeless children, when tested, perform rather poorly in the area of academics.
In the first study (Sheltered Homeless Children: Their Eligibility and Unmet Need for Special Education evaluations) homeless shelters were selected randomly and from these families were selected that consisted of one child aged 6 to 12 years. Testing was performed in a quiet place. There were 118 parents and 169 children involved in the study. The parents were asked questions pertaining to the how and why of homelessness. The homeless children were tested with questions from the RAND Course of Homelessness Study 3.9, a Behavior Checklist, the Peabody Picture Vocabulary Test, the National Health Service, and the Woodcock-Johnson Language Proficiency Battery Assessment Test. The Peabody Vocabulary picture test was also used in the second study.
In the second study (Cognitive and Academic Functioning of Homeless Children compared with Housed Children) the homeless children and their mothers selected for the study were from the Bronx in NY. There were 102 homeless children in the study. They were between the ages of 6-11, around the same age group as the first study; they were sought out of public schools. The housed children were selected randomly for the study. The mothers were asked how and why they became homeless and how long they had been homeless, and if they had a job, as in the study before. The children were all tested with numerous tests pertaining to their academic and cognitive functioning skills. The Raven's Test, the Peabody Picture Vocabulary Test, the Wide-range Achievement Test, a Child Depression Inventory test, and A maternal Anxiety test were issued to the children.
Both of the studies focused...
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